


I Wish -

by TopHatCat



Category: Red Dead Redemption (Video Games)
Genre: Angst, Canonical Character Death, One Shot, Pre-Video Game: Red Dead Redemption 2 (2018), Regret, chapter 4 sadness, dutch being sad, i don't know what to tag, it's anger and sadness, vandermatthews or friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-04
Updated: 2020-06-04
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:54:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,198
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24534145
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TopHatCat/pseuds/TopHatCat
Summary: Maybe, in their line of work, death is always the price. Hosea learned that lesson too late and Dutch pretend they could outrun it forever.Just a sad little one shot about death and Dutch and Hosea's relationship.
Relationships: Hosea Matthews & Dutch van der Linde, Hosea Matthews/Dutch van der Linde
Comments: 8
Kudos: 22





	I Wish -

“I wish you were dead.”

The words were sour on Dutch’s tongue but he said them anyway, poisoning the atmosphere with their toxicity. In the closeness of the tent, they stifled him, thickening the air between the two men. Hosea didn’t flinch and Dutch nearly wilted at the realization that he had so little impact on the man, so little control of the situation. 

“We’re leaving in the morning.” Hosea’s voice was calm, collected, every inch of him ice to Dutch’s fire. “That’s all I came here to say.”

Fists clenched at his side, but he would never strike Hosea, not even for this betrayal. This _abandonment_.

“She’ll never love you like I loved you,” he said, voice loud, loud enough for it to escape the canvas walls and touch the night sky. Maybe he hoped Bessie would hear his words and realize that _she_ could never be what _he_ was to Hosea. “She’ll never be what _I am_.”

To his shock, Hosea did not show anger, but rather, his eyes softened and his hand lifted as if he wanted to touch Dutch. “Of course not,” he said. “I never expected her to be you.” His arm lowered again and he stepped back, disrupting the invisible ties that were growing between them. Dutch felt the bonds tearing as Hosea moved to the tent flap, pushing it back and letting the cool night air rush in. “If I’m not dead in the morning…we’ll say goodbye then.”

He left Dutch standing with his fists loosening and a lump in his throat he didn’t know how to dislodge.

***

“I wish I was dead.”

The words were sobbed on hands and knees in front of a gravestone that bore the name ‘Bessie Matthews’. Hosea sat before it with his back bowed and arms wrapped around his chest, shaking like a leaf from the tree the marker was placed beneath. Dutch stood over him, black umbrella held out to stop the rain that would have fallen on the man, mouth pulled into a frown under his moustache.

“She wouldn’t want you dead,” Dutch said, crouching, hand resting on the spot between Hosea’s shoulder blades, feeling the body tremble with sobs. _‘I don’t want you dead.’_ The selfish thought crept in and he pushed it away. This was not about what he wanted right now; this was about Hosea and his dead wife.

He put a strong arm around the older man, nearly lifted him to his feet. Balancing the umbrella in the crook of his arm, he put his hands to either side of Hosea’s face, forcing their gazes to meet. Hosea’s eyes were dull and unfocused, a result of sorrow and alcohol…copious amounts that Dutch could smell on his breath and his hair when he pulled him into a close embrace. Hosea let himself be held, arms limps at his sides, as Dutch smoothed his messy blond hair.

“Stay alive, old girl. It’ll get better with time.”

***

“I wish you were dead.”

The words were said accusingly and Dutch responded with a grunt, refusing to switch his attention from his cigar to the man who sat in the folding chair beside him.

“You and everyone else,” he muttered to the hazy afternoon air that buzzed with flies, and to the dank swamp water that ran with alligators. He spit a gnat from his mouth and put the cigar between his teeth instead, inhaling the smoke that was too hot for the muggy weather.

“Why did you lead us here, Dutch?” Hosea’s voice was tired, bitter. “What have we achieved besides needless death and sorrow?”

“We’ve achieved _freedom_ , Hosea,” was his reply, tongue running like a broken record. His mouth felt sore from reworking the same words through it every day, but he didn’t know how to find new ones, and silence was his greatest enemy and biggest fear. So he kept talking. “No one said it wouldn’t come at a cost.”

He felt Hosea shift, heard the sharp breath as the old man stood with aching joints. Dutch kept his eyes fixed on a gator that had swum close, its maw open wide. A bird hopped to its teeth to pick out bits of the gator’s last meal and Dutch marveled at the danger the little thing risked.

“Well maybe the cost should be yours,” Hosea said. “Not ours.”

Dutch heard him leave, boots creaking on the wooden boards of the pier, and only turned to watch the narrow back recede when he knew his gaze would not be met. Words were cruel things…but the disappointment he knew haunted Hosea’s eyes was something else entirely.

***

_‘I wish….’_

The thought came to him as he stood on the outskirts of camp, watching the sunset. The trees around Beaver Hollow kept the horizon from him, but the light still filtered through the leaves, painting the place in orange and red.

There was little sound from the camp behind him. The activity and bustle that had become commonplace over the years was gone, and the sudden silence rang almost painfully in his ears. There was nothing to distract him…no small talk, no cheerful fire to find company at.

His best company was gone now, and he was alone.

 _‘I didn’t get to say goodbye,’_ he’d realized, waking up in a cold sweat on the boat they'd fled to. There was no chance to say farewell, only a frantic meeting of the eyes, names unspoken on breathless lips until-

_“Hosea.”_

But it had been too late by then.

It hadn’t taken him long to realize the ache in his chest wasn’t going to go away. The hot tropical heat had only made it worse, trapping each breath in his lungs until he thought he may burst from the building pressure. It lingered still now, as the sun dipped lower behind the trees, a constant reminder that the half of him that had meant everything, had been _everything,_ was gone. Time heals all wounds, he had been told, though he knew now that this wasn’t a wound, but a scar.

Everyone looked at him like it was his fault.

“ _He_ thought it was a good idea,” was his reply, “Why is everything _my_ fault?” and he’d watched Arthur’s worn, tired face shut him out even further.

What had he been willing to pay for the promise of wealth, of riches, of revenge? The cost was a life, and the dept had been paid, but it had been too much. That which he named freedom called for payment, and he had been too scared to offer up his own.

And yet, despite the fact that he still stood above ground, grass beneath his boots, breeze against his skin, breath in his lungs…he felt as if he were separate from it all, like death had claimed his soul and forgotten his body.

Like it had taken the best of him and left only an empty shell.

 _‘I wish I were dead,’_ he thought, looking at the gun in his hand. _‘But…I already am, aren’t I?”_

He holstered the revolver as the sun disappeared beyond his sight and the light faded from the sky.

**Author's Note:**

> hnng I may have cried a little as I wrote this. please excuse any typos, it's late.
> 
> instagram @nevareck_tophatcat, all i draw these days are cowboys


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